My dad just graduated from a year full immersion te reo Māori course.
The ceremony was full of emotion and as I watched family after family get up in support of their person, they performed beautiful haka, waiata and karanga.
As actors, words are our weapon to carry emotion. In musicals the character must sing because the emotion is too big for mere words. There’s no other option.
But of course the emotion is always too big for words. Shakespeare knew that words fail. The prettiest, fanciest or coolest words strung together pale in comparison to the ocean and galaxy of energy they represent, pumping out of our heart.
These families had the gift of song and of haka to carry their pride. To stand and make all the beautiful noise they could to show a tiny preview of what’s going on inside.
How lucky that we have our culture and our art to begin to express what’s inside us.
Yes, words fail. Songs fail. But the humble pursuit to use both to express ourselves is a beautiful one.
SING! MAKE NOISE! SHARE!
